Misadventures in grad school, running, and life

running

We’re having a lazy Sunday morning over here (the best) after a pretty full week of everything.

Inda and Loony and Indy and Luna and I went out to the greenway back by the old Wench house on a rather gray day so the dogs could get out some energy.

Pretty sure this is what Pooh and Piglet would look like if they were dogs!

It was pretty eventful since Luna, who HATES water, tried to follow Indy across a creek and got herself stuck. Rather than helping her, which is what kind and normal people would do, I sat there, laughed and took a short video of her trials.

Don’t worry, she figured it out and is safe and sound and was only a little traumatized from the water.

I also hit up the library for some quality people watching paper writing time. Also I needed to try out some of the other kooky chairs. Priorities y’all .

Then, Steve and I decided to go work out. Smart idea right?? Wrong.

Since it’s been a while since we’ve visited the gym, we both tried to make up for lost time by working out extra hard. Bad idea.

I ran so hard I gave myself heartburn and other gastric issues. Apparently 9mph is pretty fast?? Steve overdid it on the leg press and strained his knee a bit. I was going to do a bit of strength training after the run but couldn’t function/breathe so I went and sat in the sauna until I could walk around without dying.

This is my “Oops WTF did I just do” face.

We grabbed some beers with Matt and Lisa decided to not move again for the rest of the night.

Adulting is hard….cleaning, showering, exercising, working, paying bills, eating, and it just never stops.

I’ve been pretty lazy about this whole half marathon training thing. I’d like to completely blame it on the fact that I may or may not be able to afford the trip out to San Diego to the run the thing in the first place. It’s hard to stay motivated to genuinely ‘train’ for something when you’re not sure you’re even going to run it!

But, because we’re being honest here. I’m going through a bit of a lazy spell. The motivation to work out every day just isn’t there. Hell. The motivation to shower and cook and survive every day just isn’t there either.

Trigger warning about depression and possible spelling errors ahead.

Can’t medication be a magical cure all?? Seriously, that just needs to happen. The alternative is just too much work. It’s really frustrating when everything is going great and your life is chugging along like The Little Engine That Could and then all of a sudden your sweet childhood book looks something like this..

Not gonna lie, August was a little rough in the PhDeviant household. Puppy + ACL surgery + Last min trips + start of school = a household just trying to make it through each day in one piece. A whole month of that usually results in forgetting how to return to functioning normally.

Aaaaaaaand that’s exactly what happened.

So much energy was spent on making sure each day was accomplished that now that the pressure is off, my brain is kinda off in no-mans-land

My instinctual response to winding up on a deserted road is to resort to ‘depression-state’ or the lesser known ‘lack of motivation state that leads to depression state’. Either way, it’s not awesome.

The best thing to do at this point is to just continue on with life as though nothing is different and the motivation will come back at some point I think.

To end this post on a happier note, here’s a Calvin and Hobbes quote because those are awesome

It’s Friday…Friday…gotta get down on Friday (sings to self cause I’m a nerd like that)

Please tell me you guys have some awesome plans for the weekend, because my plans are unpacking and cleaning…ugh. Need to live vicariously through other people this weekend.

In random news, have you ever seen a pineapple plant?

Now you have! The weird part about this is that it is inside the Textiles Engineering building. Pineapple<–>textiles<–>confused Amanda?? Note to everyone in this building though, I TOTALLY CALL THAT PINEAPPLE WHEN IT’S RIPE ENOUGH TO EAT

Workout world wise (yes I’m smiling gleefully at that alliteration) I did a quick 35 min treadmill sesh because I don’t enjoy feeling like death and drowning in sweat while I run. At least my view isn’t bad

I threw some intervals in there while rocking out to the newest Fall Out Boy album (fast pace was a 7:30 min/mile or 8mph and slow was about a 9 min/mile) and got in 3.8 miles

Afterwards, because our gym has a ballet bar and I insist on using it and because stretching is important, I stretched it out in our aerobics room!

At approximately 8:20am the 25-29 women’s age group began the swim in Jordan Lake for Ironman Raleigh 70.3.

And I wasn’t there.

And it sucks.

It sucks because I set a goal for myself and didn’t reach it. It sucks because I spent months training for it. It sucks because I spent what little extra money I have on it. It sucks because I won’t get that awesome race high/bling/post race euphoria.

But it’s ok.

It’s ok because I chose grad school over this one race. It’s ok because I can enjoy my vacation without feeling exhausted. It’s ok because I’m not going to injure myself by racing hard.

But most importantly it’s ok because this was just one race. There are so many more races I can do that will fit my schedule better right now. So, for the time being, I am putting my long distance triathlon dreams on hold. I can’t spend 8 hrs on a bike every Saturday because I have to spend those 8 hrs rebuilding a 3D printer. I can however, work on a new 5k PR, training for the USA Nationals Half Marathon in November, and improving my olympic distance triathlon PR.

Not to mention I got a brag-worthy shirt and awesome backpack out of it too.